Abdullah Öcalan, the jailed leader of the PKK terrorist group, may be open to accepting a call from Turkish politicians to end terrorism but with conditions, according to a lawmaker and family member, amid a new debate in Türkiye over how to handle the terrorism issue.
“If the conditions are right, I have the theoretical and practical power to move this process from the level of conflict and violence to a political and legal level,” Öcalan was quoted as saying by Ömer Öcalan, a member of the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) and Öcalan’s nephew.
The PKK is classified as a terrorist organization by Ankara, the European Union and the U.S. PKK leader Öcalan has been imprisoned on an island off Istanbul since 1999.
He was this week allowed to receive visitors for the first time in years and is doing well, his nephew wrote on social media platform X following his visit to the prison on the island of İmralı.
Öcalan’s response came shortly after Devlet Bahçeli, the head of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), ally to the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party), pitched the possible release of Öcalan who could “come to Parliament and make a speech” should he announce that the PKK would lay down arms.
Bahçeli said his call was straightforward. His unexpected move was a clarion call on the longstanding issue in which many politicians pursuing different ideologies have been at odds for decades.
The move by Bahçeli, perhaps the most staunch opponent of the terrorist group, irked many at first but found support from President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who spoke of a “historic” opportunity after the MHP leader’s statement.
While Bahçeli’s cryptic call has had mixed responses, pundits have said this could be a sign of the possible beginning of a new process between the Turkish government and the PKK, which has been waging its bloody terror campaign since the 1980s.
The latest attempt at talks failed in 2015 when PKK resumed its attacks in the southeast during negotiations.
The MHP announcement on Tuesday came the day before a PKK attack on an aerospace firm in Ankara, which left five dead.
